Dec. 9, 2012

Bob Dixon

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Employees in the Children’s Division are slowed down by data entry requirements that can keep them out of the field — where they do the front-line work of protecting kids — say those who interact with abuse workers.

Bradley Harmon, president of the Communications Workers of America local union 6355, which represents Children’s Division workers, said at one point in the past, the computer program used by workers did not allow copying and pasting.

In practice, this meant that even if workers were entering an identical report into three different case files, the report had to be typed out each time.

“Yeah, that was really frustrating,” Harmon said.

Interviews with those familiar with the Children’s Division work confirm statements made Monday by Sen. Bob Dixon, R-Springfield, at the Joint Committee on Child Abuse and Neglect. It is a legislative panel tasked with examining how the state responds to child abuse. At a committee hearing, Dixon said he has spent several hours speaking with Children’s Division workers and found that inefficiencies in record-keeping are slowing them down.

The Children’s Division uses the Family and Children’s Electronic System, a computer program developed to document and track case progress. But the design of the program creates unnecessary redundancy, Harmon said.

For instance, if a Children’s Division worker visits a home with three children, a report on that visit will be placed into the file for each of the three children. And even though the report for each child may be very similar, three separate reports must still be made.

“If you’ve got three reports on the same day from the same family, it’s almost impossible for you to consolidate that down to one report,” Harmon said.

Melinda Nicholson is a governor-appointed member of the Missouri Foster Care Adoption Board, which acts as an independent overseer of Children’s Division foster care and adoption policies. She estimates that workers spend at least 50 percent of their time entering data.

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For several months in Greene County, some investigators were required to do nothing but input data between 8 and 10 a.m. each day, Harmon said. He said that a single person could probably input the data on five cases in a day if that was all he or she did.

The News-Leader sent a list of points raised in this story to the Missouri Department of Social Services, which oversees the Children’s Division, for comment or explanation. The department did not respond. An initial inquiry about Dixon’s statements yielded only a brief, nonspecific statement. (See the box with the story.)

Calls seeking to reach Heather Ford, the Children’s Division circuit manager in Greene County, were not returned.

Emily van Schenkhof, deputy director of Missouri Kids First, was at the committee hearing where Dixon made his statements. She said she had not previously heard about the data entry issue that Dixon raised, but said she was reaching out to his office for more information.

Both Harmon and Nicholson said some workers have taken documentation into their own hands and have purchased iPads with their own money to use in the field.

“They can do a lot of their paperwork in the field and then they don’t have to duplicate it when they get back to the office,” Nicholson said.

Harmon said he cautions workers about using their own equipment because of issues of security and confidentiality. He did say he believes the Greene County office has only two laptops for use by workers in the field.

Without electronic note-taking in the field, workers must take written notes first, then input the notes into the computer, eating up time.

Turnover also a problem

During Monday’s hearing, in which Dixon participated via telephone, he also spoke of high turnover within the department.

Harmon said in Greene County, eight employees in the Children’s Division investigations unit have quit since July. The unit is supposed to be staffed with about 35 workers, he said, adding that while he understands the positions have been filled, many of the new employees are still in training.

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Nicholson said that as of October, she knew the Greene County office had several open positions.

“I know that within the unit they’re so short-staffed, they’ve had to ask supervisors and specialists to take on cases. And this is a problem that is chronic,” Harmon said.

State accreditation standards recommend no more than 15 serious cases or 30 assessments per month for one caseworker with a master’s degree or specialized, intensive training.

However, those standards are often exceeded.

For example, Jason Davis of Springfield, a member of the statewide union for Children’s Division workers and an employee in the Greene County office, has previously told the News-Leader he had 27 reports of abuse or neglect during the month of March.

Deadlines are then missed.

In 2011, the Greene County office met its state-mandated deadlines for checking reports of child abuse and neglect on average about 37 percent of the time. Reports are supposed to be investigated within 30 days.

For all of 2011, the county office received 3,992 reports — and was able to complete investigations into 1,462.

Burnout becomes an issue, Nicholson said, with investigators often coming into contact with horrifying locations and situations.

“Investigators, in particular, see so much,” Nicholson said, mentioning homes infested with roaches, children with broken bones and those bearing signs of sexual abuse.

Long hours on the job are not rewarded with overtime, Harmon said. Rather, overtime is compensated with time off later, called compensatory time, he said.

But with a short staff, taking compensatory time becomes difficult, creating a problematic cycle where workers gather increasing amounts of compensatory time they are unable to use. Sometimes the hours are capped at 80, Harmon said, but at other times there are no caps.

Without caps, workers who make between $30,000-35,000 a year can accumulate hundreds of hours of compensatory time.

It is hard to use it, but there is one catch.

If a worker quits, the time is paid out. That can be several weeks worth of pay for a worker who has accumulated hundreds of hours.

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“It can become a real incentive to quit,” Harmon said.

Employees are not always fearful of walking away to take new jobs, Harmon said. Case workers must have a bachelor’s degree in social work or a related field, Harmon said, and supervisors must have a master’s degree. Because Children’s Division workers are in close contact with community organizations that address child abuse and are often well aware of openings and usually qualified.

Complicating the problem, the Children’s Division cannot hire a replacement while the compensatory time is being paid out, Nicholson said.

“When you have someone leave, sometimes they have paid time off or other benefits and even though that position is open, you can’t hire right away,” Nicholson said.

Nicholson said she knew of one Children’s Division office, not Greene County’s, that has staffed only one-third of its positions. She declined to say which office.

The frequent staff changes, in turn, make case documentation even more important, even though it consumes so much worker time.

“What we see all too often is changes in who is managing a case, and when a new person is taking over a case they don’t have a history of the case,” Kelly Schultz, director of the Office of Child Advocate, said.

Some of these issues are likely to be aired during hearings of the Joint Committee.

Dottie Mullikin, executive director of Isabel’s House in Springfield, said changes need to come, but she urged the committee to examine all the issues in context, considering related matters of child welfare. If the state is looking at a budget shortfall, that makes addressing issues more difficult, Mullikin said. Nevertheless, she said she is optimistic about the committee’s work.

Ultimately, the situation will not change unless the public decides to change it, she said, adding:

The State’s ResponseIn response to a request Tuesday for comment about Sen. Bob Dixon’s specifics statements regarding Children’s Division workers, the Department of Social Services, which oversees Children’s Division, did not address points he raised. The department sent the following statement: “The Children’s Division is dedicated to preventing child abuse and neglect. We will continue to work with all stakeholders and the public to ensure that our practices and procedures are effective in promoting the safety of children and their families. Meanwhile, we encourage anyone who suspects child abuse or neglect to call our toll free hotline at 1-800-392-3738.” On Thursday, a list of points included in this story was sent to Rebecca Woelfel, Social Services spokesperson who provided the first statement, for comment or explanation. Woelfel provided no response to the second inquiry.